Software system and associated methods for facilitating the analysis and management of web sites

ABSTRACT

A visual Web site analysis program, implemented as a collection of software components, provides a variety of features for facilitating the analysis and management of Web sites and Web site content. A mapping component scans a Web site over a network connection and builds a site map which graphically depicts the URLs and links of the site. Site maps are generated using a unique layout and display methodology which allows the user to visualize the overall architecture of the Web site. Various map navigation and URL filtering features are provided to facilitate the task of identifying and repairing common Web site problems, such as links to missing URLs. A dynamic page scan feature enables the user to include dynamically-generated Web pages within the site map by capturing the output of a standard Web browser when a form is submitted by the user, and then automatically resubmitting this output during subsequent mappings of the site. The Web site analysis program is implemented using an extensible architecture which includes an API that allows plug-in applications to manipulate the display of the site map. Various plug-ins are provided which utilize the API to extend the functionality of the analysis program, including an action tracking plug-in which detects user activity and behavioral data (link activity levels, common site entry and exit points, etc.) from server log files and then superimposes such data onto the site map.

PRIORITY CLAIM

This application claims the benefit of U.S. provisional application Ser.No. 60/028,474 (of the same title) filed Oct. 15, 1996, which is herebyincorporated by reference.

APPENDICES

This specification includes a partial source code listing and an API(application program interface) listing of a preferred embodiment of theinvention, attached as Appendices A and B, respectively. These materialsform part of the disclosure of the specification.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to database management and analysis tools.More particularly, the present invention relates to software tools forfacilitating the management and analysis of World Wide Web sites andother types of database systems which utilize hyperlinks to facilitateuser navigation.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

With the increasing popularity and complexity of Internet and intranetapplications, the task of managing Web site content and maintaining Website effectiveness has become increasingly difficult. Company Webmastersand business managers are routinely faced with a wide array ofburdensome tasks, including, for example, the identification and repairof large numbers of broken links (i.e., links to missing URLs), themonitoring and organization of large volumes of diverse,continuously-changing Web site content, and the detection and managementof congested links. These problems are particularly troublesome forcompanies that rely on their respective Web sites to providemission-critical information and services to customers and businesspartners.

Several software companies have developed software products whichaddress some of these problems by generating graphical maps of Web sitecontent and providing tools for navigating and managing the contentdisplayed within the maps. Examples of such software tools includeWebMapper™ from Netcarta Corporation and WebAnalyzer™ from InContextCorporation. Unfortunately, the graphical site maps generated by theseproducts tend to be difficult to navigate, and fail to convey much ofthe information needed by Webmasters to effectively manage complex Websites. As a result, many companies continue to resort to the burdensometask of manually generating large, paper-based maps of their Web sites.In addition, many of these products are only capable of mapping certaintypes of Web pages, and do not provide the types of analysis toolsneeded by Webmasters to evaluate the performance and effectiveness ofWeb sites.

The present invention addresses these and other limitations in existingproducts and technologies.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTIVE FEATURES

In accordance with the present invention, a software package ("Web siteanalysis program") is provided which includes a variety of features forfacilitating the management and analysis of Web sites. In the preferredembodiment, the program runs on a network-connected PC under theWindows® 95 or Windows® NT operating system, and utilizes the standardprotocols and conventions of the World Wide Web ("Web"). In otherembodiments, the program may be adapted to provide for the analysis ofother types of hypertextual-content sites, including sites based onnonstandard protocols.

In the preferred embodiment, the program includes Web site scanningroutines which use conventional webcrawling techniques to gatherinformation about the content objects (HTML documents, GIF files, etc.)and links of a Web site via a network connection. Mapping routines ofthe program in-turn use this information to generate, on the computer'sdisplay screen, a graphical site map that shows the overall architecture(i.e., the structural arrangement of content objects and links) of theWeb site. A user interface of the program allows the user to performactions such as initiate and pause the scanning/mapping of a Web site,zoom in and out on portions of a site map, apply content filters to thesite map to filter out content objects of specific types, and save andretrieve maps to/from disk. A map comparison tool allows the user togenerate a comparison map which highlights changes that have been madeto the Web site since a previous mapping of the site.

In accordance with one aspect of the invention, the Web site analysisprogram implements a map generation method which greatly facilitates thevisualization by the user of the overall architecture of the Web site,and allows the user to navigate the map in an intuitive manner toexplore the content of the Web site. To generate the site map, astructural representation of the Web site (specifying the actualarrangement of content objects and links) is initially reduced, forpurposes of generating the site map, to a hierarchical treerepresentation in which each content object of the Web site isrepresented as a node of the tree. A recursive layout method is thenapplied which uses the parent-child node relationships, as suchrelationships exist within the tree, to spatially position the nodes(represented as respective icons within the map) on the display screensuch that children nodes are positioned around and connected to theirrespective immediate parents. (This layout method can also be used todisplay other types of hierarchical data structures, such as the treestructure of a conventional file system.) The result is a map whichcomprises a hierarchical arrangement of parentchild child node (icon)clusters in which parent-child relationships are immediately apparent.

As part of the layout method, the relative sizes of the node icons arepreferably adjusted such that nodes with relatively large numbers ofoutgoing links have a relatively large icon size, and thus stand out inthe map. In addition, the node and link display sizes are automaticallyadjusted such that the entire map is displayed on the display screen,regardless of the size of the Web site. As the user zooms in on portionsof the map, additional details of the Web site's content objects areautomatically revealed within the map.

In accordance with another aspect of the invention, the Web siteanalysis program is based on an extensible architecture that allowssoftware components to be added that make extensive use of the program'smapping functionality. Specifically, the architecture includes an API(application program interface) which includes API procedures("methods") that allow other applications ("plug-ins") to, among otherthings, manipulate the display attributes of the nodes and links withina site map. Using these methods, a plug-in application can be addedwhich dynamically superimposes data onto the site map by, for example,selectively modifying display colors of nodes and links, selectivelyhiding nodes and links, and/or attaching alphanumeric annotations to thenodes and links. The API also includes methods for allowing plug-incomponents to access Web site data (both during and following the Website scanning process) retrieved by the scanning routines, and foradding menu commands to the user interface of the main program.

In accordance with another aspect of the invention, software routines(preferably implemented within a plug-in application) are provided forprocessing a Web site's server access log file to generate Web siteusage data, and for displaying the usage data on a site map. This usagedata may, for example, be in the form of the number of "hits" per link,the number of Web site exit events per node, or the navigation pathstaken by specific users ("visitors"). This usage data is preferablygenerated by processing the entries within the log file on a per-visitorbasis to determine the probable navigation path taken by each respectivevisitor to the Web site. (Standard-format access log files which recordeach access to any page of the Web site are typically maintained byconventional Web servers.) In a preferred implementation, the usage datais then superimposed onto the site map (using the API methods) usingdifferent node and link display colors to represent different respectivelevels of user activity. Using this feature, Webmasters can readilydetect common "problem areas" such as congested links and popular Website exit points. In addition, by looking at individual navigation pathson a per-visitor basis, Webmasters can identify popular navigation pathstaken by visitors to the site.

In accordance with yet another aspect of the invention, the Web siteanalysis program includes software routines and associated userinterface controls for automatically scanning and mappingdynamically-generated Web pages, such as Web pages generated"on-the-fly" in response to user-specified database queries. Thisfeature generally involves the two-step process of capturing andrecording a dataset manually entered by the user into an embedded formof a Web page (such as a page of a previously-mapped Web site), and thenautomatically resubmitting the dataset (within the form) when the Website is later re-scanned. As will be appreciated, this feature of theinvention can also be applied to conventional Internet search engines.

To effectuate the capture of one or more datasets in the preferredimplementation, the user initiates a capture session from the userinterface; this causes a standard Web browser to be launched andtemporarily configured to use the Web site analysis program as anHTTP-level proxy to communicate with Web sites. Thereafter, until thecapture session is terminated by the user, any pages retrieved with thebrowser, and any forms (datasets) submitted from the browser, areautomatically recorded by the Web site analysis program into the sitemap. When the site map is subsequently updated (using an "automaticupdate" option of the user interface), the scanning routinesautomatically re-enter the captured datasets into the correspondingforms and recreate the form submissions. The dynamically-generated Webpages returned in response to these automatic form submissions are thenadded to the updated site map as respective nodes. A related aspect ofthe invention involves the associated method of locally capturing theoutput of the Web browser to generate a sequence that can subsequentlybe used to automatically evaluate a Web site.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The various features of the invention will now be described in greaterdetail with reference to the drawings of a preferred software packagereferred to as the Astra™ SiteManager™ Web site analysis tool ("Astra"),its screen displays, and various related components. In these drawings,reference numbers are re-used, where appropriate, to indicate acorrespondence between referenced items.

FIG. 1 is a screen display which illustrates an example Web site mapgenerated by Astra, and which illustrates the menu, tool and filter barsof the Astra graphical user interface.

FIGS. 2 and 3 are screen displays which illustrate respective zoomed-inviews of the site map of FIG. 1.

FIG. 4 is a screen display which illustrates a split-screen displaymode, wherein a graphical representation of a Web site is displayed inan upper window and a textual representation of the Web site isdisplayed in a lower window.

FIG. 5 is a screen display which illustrates a navigational aid of theAstra graphical user interface.

FIG. 6 is a screen display illustrating a feature which allows a user toselectively view the outbound links of URL in a hierarchical displayformat.

FIG. 7 is a block diagram which illustrates the general architecture ofAstra, which is shown in the context of a client computer communicatingwith a Web site.

FIG. 8 illustrates the object model used by Astra.

FIG. 9 illustrates a multi-threaded process used by Astra for scanningand mapping Web sites.

FIG. 10 illustrates the general decision process used by Astra to scan aURL.

FIG. 11 is a block diagram which illustrates a method used by Astra toscan dynamically-generated Web pages.

FIG. 12 is a flow diagram which further illustrates the method forscanning dynamically-generated Web pages.

FIGS. 13-15 are a sequence of screen displays which further illustratethe operation of Astra's dynamic page scanning feature.

FIG. 16 is a screen display which illustrates the site map of FIG. 1following the application of a filter which filters out all URLs (andassociated links) having a status other than "OK."

FIG. 17 illustrates the general program sequence followed by Astra togenerate filtered maps of the type shown in FIG. 16.

FIG. 18 illustrates the filtered map of FIG. 16 redisplayed in Astra'sVisual Web Display™ format.

FIG. 19 is a screen display which illustrates an activity monitoringfeature of Astra.

FIG. 20 illustrates a decision process used by Astra to generate linkactivity data (of the type illustrated in FIG. 19) from a server accesslog file.

FIG. 21 is a screen display which illustrates a map comparison tool ofAstra.

FIG. 22 is a screen display which illustrates a link repair feature ofAstra.

FIGS. 23 and 24 are partial screen displays which illustrate layoutfeatures in accordance with another embodiment of the invention.

The screen displays included in the figures were generated from screencaptures taken during the execution of the Astra code. In order tocomply with patent office standards, the original screen captures havebeen modified to reduce shading and to replace certain color-codedregions with appropriate cross hatching. All copyrights in these screendisplays are hereby reserved.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

The description of the preferred embodiments is arranged within thefollowing sections:

I. Glossary of Terms and Acronyms

II. Overview

III. Map Layout and Display Methodology

IV. Astra Graphical User Interface

V. Astra Software Architecture

VI. Scanning Process

VII. Scanning and Mapping of Dynamically-Generated Pages

VIII. Display of Filtered Maps

IX. Tracking and Display of Visitor Activity

X. Map Comparison Tool

XI. Link Repair Plug-in

XII. Conclusion

I. Glossary of Terms and Acronyms

The following definitions and explanations provide backgroundinformation pertaining to the technical field of the present invention,and are intended to facilitate an understanding of both the inventionand the preferred embodiments thereof. Additional definitions areprovided throughout the detailed description.

Internet. The Internet is a collection of interconnected public andprivate computer networks that are linked together by a set of standardprotocols (such as TCP/IP, HTTP, FTP and Gopher) to form a global,distributed network.

Document. Generally, a collection of data that can be viewed using anapplication program, and that appears or is treated as a self-containedentity. Documents typically include control codes that specify how thedocument content is displayed by the application program. An "HTMLdocument" is a special type of document which includes HTML (HyperTextMarkup Language) codes to permit the document to be viewed using a Webbrowser program. An HTML document that is accessible on a World Wide Website is commonly referred to as a "Web document" or "Web page." Webdocuments commonly include embedded components, such as GIF (GraphicsInterchange Format) files, which are represented within the HTML codingas links to other URLs. (See "HTML" and "URL" below.)

Hyperlink. A navigational link from one document to another, or from oneportion (or component) of a document to another. Typically, a hyperlinkis displayed as a highlighted word or phrase that can be clicked onusing the mouse to jump to the associated document or document portion.

Hypertext System. A computer-based informational system in whichdocuments (and possibly other types of data entities) are linkedtogether via hyperlinks to form a user-navigable "web." Although theterm "text" appears within "hypertext," the documents and hyperlinks ofa hypertext system may (and typically do) include other forms of media.For example, a hyperlink to a sound file may be represented within adocument by graphic image of an audio speaker.

World Wide Web. A distributed, global hypertext system, based on an setof standard protocols and conventions (such as HTTP and HTML, discussedbelow), which uses the Internet as a transport mechanism. A softwareprogram which allows users to request and view World Wide Web ("Web")documents is commonly referred to as a "Web browser," and a programwhich responds to such requests by returning ("serving") Web documentsis commonly referred to as a "Web server."

Web Site. As used herein, "web site" refers generally to a database orother collection of inter-linked hypertextual documents ("webdocuments") and associated data entities, which is accessible via acomputer network, and which forms part of a larger, distributedinformational system. Depending upon its context, the term may alsorefer to the associated hardware and/or software server components usedto provide access to such documents. When used herein with initialcapitalization (i.e., "Web site"), the term refers more specifically toa web site of the World Wide Web. (In general, a Web site corresponds toa particular Internet domain name, such as "merc-int.com," and includesthe content of or associated with a particular organization.) Othertypes of web sites may include, for example, a hypertextual database ofa corporate "intranet" (i.e., an internal network which uses standardInternet protocols), or a site of a hypertext system that uses documentretrieval protocols other than those of the World Wide Web.

Content Object. As used herein, a data entity (document, documentcomponent, etc.) that can be selectively retrieved from a web site. Inthe context of the World Wide Web, common types of content objectsinclude HTML documents, GIF files, sound files, video files, Javaapplets and aglets, and downloadable applications, and each object has aunique identifier (referred to as the "URL") which specifies thelocation of the object. (See "URL" below.)

URL (Uniform Resource Locator). A unique address which fully specifiesthe location of a content object on the Internet. The general format ofa URL is protocol://machine-address/path/filename. (As will be apparentfrom the context in which it is used, the term "URL" is also used hereinto refer to the corresponding content object itself.)

Graph/Tree. In the context of database systems, the term "graph" (or"graph structure") refers generally to a data structure that can berepresented as a collection of interconnected nodes. As described below,a Web site can conveniently be represented as a graph in which each nodeof the graph corresponds to a content object of the Web site, and inwhich each interconnection between two nodes represents a link withinthe Web site. A "tree" is a specific type of graph structure in whichexactly one path exists from a main or "root" node to each additionalnode of the structure. The terms "parent" and "child" are commonly usedto refer to the interrelationships of nodes within a tree structure (orother hierarchical graph structure), and the term "leaf" or "leaf node"is used to refer to nodes that have no children. For additionalinformation on graph and tree data structures, see Alfred V. Aho et al,Data Structures and Algorithms, Addison-Wesley, 1982.

TCP/IP (Transfer Control Protocol/Internet Protocol). A standardInternet protocol which specifies how computers exchange data over theInternet. TCP/IP is the lowest level data transfer protocol of thestandard Internet protocols.

HTML (HyperText Markup Language). A standard coding convention and setof codes for attaching presentation and linking attributes toinformational content within documents. During a document authoringstage, the HTML codes (referred to as "tags") are embedded within theinformational content of the document. When the Web document (or "HTMLdocument") is subsequently transmitted by a Web server to a Web browser,the codes are interpreted by the browser and used to parse and displaythe document. In addition to specifying how the Web browser is todisplay the document, HTML tags can be used create hyperlinks to otherWeb documents. For more information on HTML, see Ian S. Graham, The HTMLSource Book, John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1995 (ISBN 0471-11894-4).

HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol). The standard World Wide Webclient-server protocol used for the exchange of information (such asHTML documents, and client requests for such documents) between a Webbrowser and a Web server. HTTP includes several different types ofmessages which can be sent from the client to the server to requestdifferent types of server actions. For example, a "GET" message, whichhas the format GET <URL>, causes the server to return the content objectlocated at the specified URL.

Webcrawling. Generally, the process of accessing and processing web sitecontent (typically using an automated searching/parsing program) andgenerating a condensed representation of such content. Webcrawlingroutines are commonly used by commercial Internet search engines (suchas Infoseek™ and Alta Vista™) to generate large indexes of the termsthat appear within the various Web pages of the World Wide Web.

API (Application Program Interface). A software interface that allowsapplication programs (or other types of programs) to share data orotherwise communicate with one another. A typical API comprises alibrary of API functions or "methods" which can be called in order toinitiate specific types of operations.

CGI (Common Gateway Interface). A standard interface which specifies howa Web server (or possibly another information server) launches andinteracts with external programs (such as a database search engine) inresponse to requests from clients. With CGI, the Web server can serveinformation which is stored in a format that is not readable by theclient, and present such information in the form of a client-readableWeb page. A CGI program (called a "CGI script") may be invoked, forexample, when a Web user fills out an onscreen form which specifies adatabase query. For more information on CGI, see Ian S. Graham, The HTMLSource Book, John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1995 (ISBN 0471-11894-4), pp.231-278.

OLE (Object Linking and Embedding). An object technology, implemented byWindows-based applications, which allows objects to be linked to oneanother and embedded within one another. OLE Automation, which is afeature of OLE 2, enables a program's functionality to be exposed as OLEobjects that can be used to build other applications. For additionalinformation on OLE and OLE Automation, see OLE 2 Programmer's ReferenceManual, Volume One, Microsoft Corporation, 1996 (ISBN 1-55615-628-6).

II. Overview

The present invention provides a variety of software-related featuresfor facilitating the mapping, analysis and management of Web sites. Inthe preferred embodiment, these features are embodied within a softwarepackage which runs on a client computer under either the Windows® NT orthe Windows® 95 operating system. The software package is referred toherein as "Astra."

Given the address of a Web site's home page, Astra automatically scansthe Web site and creates a graphical site map showing all of the URLs ofthe site and the links between these URLs. In accordance with one aspectof the invention, the layout and display method used by Astra forgenerating the site map provides a highly intuitive, graphicalrepresentation which allows the user to visualize the layout of thesite. Using this mapping feature, in combination with Astra's powerfulset of integrated tools for navigating, filtering and manipulating theWeb site map, users can intuitively perform such actions as isolate andrepair broken links, focus in on Web pages (and other content objects)of a particular content type and/or status, and highlight modificationsmade to a Web site since a prior mapping. In addition, users can utilizea Dynamic Scan™ feature of Astra to automatically appenddynamically-generated Web pages (such as pages generated using CGIscripts) to their maps. Further, using Astra's activity monitoringfeatures, users can monitor visitor activity levels on individual linksand URLs, and study visitor behavior patterns during Web site visits.

In accordance with another aspect of the invention, Astra has a highlyextensible architecture which facilitates the addition of new tools tothe Astra framework. As part of this architecture, a "core" Astracomponent (which includes the basic Web site scanning and mappingfunctionality) has an API for supporting the addition of plug-incomponents. This API includes functions for allowing the plug-incomponents to manipulate the display of the site map, and to displaytheir own respective data in conjunction with the Astra site map.Through this API, new applications can be added which extend thefunctionality of the package while taking advantage of the Astra mappingscheme.

Throughout this description, preliminary names of product features andsoftware components are used with initial capitalization. These namesare used herein for ease of description only, and are not intended tolimit the scope of the invention.

FIGS. 1-3 illustrate Astra's primary layout methodology, referred toherein as "Visual Web Display™," for displaying graphicalrepresentations ("maps") of Web sites. These figures will also be usedto describe some of the graphical user interface (GUI) features ofAstra.

FIG. 1 illustrates a site map 30 of a demonstration Web site which wasderived from the actual Web site of Mercury Interactive, Inc. (i.e., theURLs accessible under the "merc-int.com" Internet domain name). (Forpurposes of this detailed description, it may be assumed that "Web site"refers to the content associated with a particular Internet domainname.) The Web site is depicted by Astra as a collection of nodes, withpairs of nodes interconnected by lines. Each node of the map representsa respective content object of the Web site and corresponds to arespective URL. (The term "URL" is used herein to refer interchangeablyto both the address of the content object and to the object itself;where a distinction between the two is helpful to an understanding ofthe invention, the term "URL" is followed by an explanatoryparenthetical.) Examples of URLs (content objects) which may existwithin a typical Web site include HTML documents (also referred toherein as "Web pages"), image files (e.g., GIF and PCX files), mailmessages, Java applets and aglets, audio files, video files, andapplications.

As generally illustrated by FIGS. 3 and 4, different icons are used torepresent the different URL types when the nodes are viewed in asufficiently zoomed-in mode. (Generic icons of the type best illustratedby FIG. 18 are used to display nodes that fall below a predeterminedsize threshold.) As described below, special icons and visualrepresentations are also used to indicate status information withrespect to the URLs. For example, special icons are used to depict,respectively, inaccessible URLs, URLs which are missing, URLs for whichaccess was denied by the server, and URLs which have been detected buthave not been scanned. (The term "scan" refers generally to the processof sending informational requests to server components of a computernetwork, and in the context of the preferred embodiment, refers to theprocess of sending requests to Web server components to obtain Web sitecontent associated with specific URLs.)

The lines which interconnect the nodes (URL icons) in FIGS. 1-3 (and thesubsequent figures with screen displays) represent links between URLs.As is well understood in the art, the functions performed by these linksvary according to URL type. For example, a link from one HTML documentto another HTML document normally represents a hyperlink which allowsthe user to jump from one document to the other while navigating the Website with a browser. In FIG. 1, an example of a hyperlink which linksthe home page URL (shown at the center of the map) to another HTML page(displayed to the right of the home page) is denoted by reference number32. (As generally illustrated in FIG. I and the other figures whichillustrate screen displays, regular HTML documents are displayed byAstra as a shaded document having text thereon.) A link between an HTMLdocument and a GIF file, such as link 36 in FIG. 3, normally representsa graphic which is embedded within the Web page.

Maps of the type illustrated in FIG. 1 are generated by Astra using anHTTP-level scanning process (described below) which involves the readingand parsing the Web site's HTML pages to identify the architecture(i.e., the arrangement of URLs and links) of the Web site, and to obtainvarious status information (described below) about the Web site's URLs.The basic scanning process used for this purpose is generally similar tothe scanning process used by conventional Webcrawlers. As part ofAstra's Dynamic Scan feature, Astra additionally implements a specialdynamic page scanning process which permits dynamically-generated Webpages to be scanned and included in the Web site map. As describedbelow, this process involves capturing the output of a Web browser whenthe user submits an HTML-embedded form (such as when the user submits adatabase query), and then reusing the captured dataset during thescanning process to recreate the form submission and append the resultsto the map.

Table 1 lists the predefined icons that are used by Astra to graphicallyrepresent different URL types within site maps. As illustrated, the URLicons generally fall into two categories: object-type ("URL type") iconsand status icons. The object-type icons are used to indicate the contentor service type of URLs that have been successfully scanned. The statusicons are used to indicate the scanning status (not found, accessdenied, etc.) of URLs for which either (i) scanning has not beenperformed, or (i) scanning was unsuccessful. Various examples of thesetwo types of icons are included in the figures.

                  TABLE 1    ______________________________________    URL Type            Scanning Status    ______________________________________    HTML                Not found    HTML with Form      Not Scanned    Image               Inaccessible    Sound               Access Denied    Application    Text    Unknown    Video    Gopher    FTP    Dynamic Page    ______________________________________

Once the map has been generated, the user can interactively navigate themap using various navigation tools of the Astra GUI, such as the zoom-inand zoom-out buttons 34, 36 (FIG. 1) and the scrolling controls 40, 42(FIGS. 2 and 3). To zoom-in on a particular region of the map 30, theuser can click on the zoom-in button 34 and then use the mouse to draw abox around the map region of interest; Astra will then re-size thehighlighted region to generally fit the display screen. As will berecognized by those skilled in the art, the ability to zoom in and outbetween high level, perspective views which reveal the overallarchitecture of the site, and magnified (zoomed-in) sub-views whichreveal URL-specific information about the Web site, greatly facilitatesthe task of navigating and monitoring Web site content.

As generally illustrated by FIG. 3, the annotations (page titles,filenames, etc.) of the URLs begin to appear (below the associatedicons) as the user continues to zoom in. As further illustrated by FIG.3, the URL (address) of a node is displayed when the mouse cursor ispositioned over the corresponding icon.

While navigating the map, the user can retrieve a URL (content object)from the server by double-clicking on the corresponding URL icon; thiscauses Astra to launch the client computer's default Web browser (if notalready running), which in-turn retrieves the URL from the Web server.For example, the user can double-click on the URL icon for an HTMLdocument (using the left mouse button) to retrieve and view thecorresponding Web page. When the user clicks on a URL icon using theright mouse button, a menu appears which allows the user to perform avariety of actions with respect to the URL, including viewing the URL'sproperties, and launching an HTML editor to retrieve and edit the URL.With reference to FIG. 3, for example, the user can click on node 44(using the right mouse button), and can then launch an HTML editor toedit the HTML document and delete the reference to missing URL 45. (Asillustrated by FIG. 3, missing URLs are represented within Astra maps bya question mark icon.)

One important feature of Astra, referred to herein as "AutomaticUpdate," allows the user to update an existing Web site map to reflectany changes that have been made to the map since a prior mapping of thesite. To initiate this feature, the user selects a "start AutomaticUpdate" button 37 (FIG. 1), or selects the corresponding menu item,while viewing a site map. This initiates a re-scanning process in whichAstra scans the URLs of the Web site and updates the map data structureto reflect the current architecture of the site. As part of thisprocess, Astra implements a caching protocol which eliminates the needto download URLs and URL headers that have not been modified since themost recent mapping. (This protocol is described below under the heading"SCANNING PROCESS.") This typically allows the map to be updated in amuch shorter period of time than is required to perform the originalmapping. This feature is particularly useful for Webmasters of complexWeb sites that have rapidly changing content.

III. Map Layout and Display Methodology (FIGS. 1-3, 23 and 24)

An important aspect of the invention is the methodology used by Astrafor presenting the user with a graphical, navigable representation ofthe Web site. This feature of Astra, which is referred to as Visual WebDisplay (abbreviated as "VWD" herein), allows the user to view andnavigate complex Web structures while visualizing the interrelationshipsbetween the data entities of such structures. The method used by Astrato generate VWD site maps is referred to herein as the "Solar Layoutmethod," and is described at the end of this section.

One aspect of the VWD format is the manner in which children nodes("children") are displayed relative to their respective parent nodes("parents"). (In the context of the preferred embodiment, the term"node" refers generally to a URL icon as displayed within the site map.)As illustrated by the collection of nodes shown in FIG. 3, the parent 44is displayed in the center of the cluster, and the seven children 48 arepositioned around the parent 44 over an angular range of 360 degrees.One benefit of this layout pattern is that it allows collections ofrelated nodes to be grouped together on the screen in relatively closeproximity to one another, making it easy for the user identify theparent-child relationships of the nodes. This is in contrast to theexpandable folder type representations used by Webmapper™, the Windows®95 Explorer, and other Windows® applications, in which it is common fora child to be separated from its parent folder by a long list of otherchildren.

In this FIG. 3 example, all of the children 48 are leaf nodes (i.e.,nodes which do not themselves have children). As a result, all of thechildren 48 are positioned approximately equidistant from the parent 44,and are spaced apart from one another by substantially equal angularincrements. Similar graphical representations to that of FIG. 3 areillustrated in FIG. I by node clusters 52, 54 and 56. As illustrated bythese three clusters in FIG. 1, both (i) the size of parent icon and(ii) the distance from the parent to its children are proportional tothe number of immediate children of the parent. Thus, for example,cluster 56 has a larger diameter (and a larger parent icon) thanclusters 52 and 54. This has the desirable effect of emphasizing thepages of the Web site that have the largest numbers of outgoing links.(As used herein, the term "outgoing links" includes links to GIF filesand other embedded components of document.)

As best illustrated by cluster 64 in FIG. 2, of which node 65 is theprimary parent or "root" node, children which have two or more of theirown children (i.e., grandchildren of the root) are positioned at agreater distance from the root node 65 than the leaf nodes of thecluster, with this distance being generally proportional to the size ofthe sub-cluster of which the child is the parent. For example, node 66(which has 3 children) is positioned farther from the cluster's rootnode 65 than leaf nodes 70; and the parent of cluster 60 is positionedfarther from the root node 65 than node 66. As illustrated in FIG. 1,this layout principal is advantageously applied to all of the nodes ofthe Web site that have children. The recursive method (referred to as"Solar Layout") used by Astra to implement these layout and displayprinciples is described below.

Another aspect of the layout method is that the largest "satellite"cluster of a parent node is centered generally opposite from (along thesame line as) the incoming link to the parent node. This is illustrated,for example, by cluster 54 in FIG. I and by cluster 60 in FIG. 2, bothof which are positioned along the same line as their respective parents.This aspect of the layout arrangement tends to facilitate visualizationby the user of the overall architecture of the site.

As will be apparent from an observation of FIG. 1, the graphical mapproduced by the application of the above layout and display principleshas a layout which resembles the general arrangement of a solar system,with the home page positioned as the sun, the children of the home pagebeing in orbit around the sun, the grandchildren of the home page beingin orbit around their immediate respective parents, and so on. Onebenefit of this mapping arrangement is that it is well suited fordisplaying the entire site map of a complex Web site on a single displayscreen (as illustrated in FIG. 1). Another benefit is that it providesan intuitive structure for navigating the URLs of a complex Web site.While this mapping methodology is particularly useful for the mapping ofWeb sites, the methodology can also be applied, with the realization ofsimilar benefits, to the mapping of other types of databases. Forexample, the VWD methodology can be used to facilitate the viewing andnavigation of a conventional PC file system.

Another benefit of this site map layout and display methodology is thatthe resulting display structure is well suited for the overlaying ofinformation on the map. Astra takes full advantage of this benefit byproviding a set of API functions which allow other applications (Astraplug-ins) to manipulate and add their respective display data to thesite map. An example of an Astra plug-in which utilizes this feature isthe Action Tracker™ tool, which superimposes user activity data onto thesite map based on analyses of server access log files. The Astra plug-inAPI and the Action Tracker plug-in are described in detail below.

As illustrated in FIG. 1, all of the nodes of the site map (with theexception of the home page node) are displayed as having a singleincoming link, even though some of the URLs of the depicted Web siteactually have multiple incoming links. Stated differently, the Web siteis depicted in the site map 30 as though the URLs are arranged within atree data structure (with the home page as the main root), even though atree data structure is not actually used. This simplification to the Website architecture is made by extracting a span tree from the actual Website architecture prior to the application of a recursive layoutalgorithm, and then displaying only those links which are part of thespanning tree. (In applications in which the database being mapped isalready arranged within a tree directory structure, this step can beomitted.) As a result, each URL of the Web site is displayed exactlyonce in the site map. Thus, for example, even though a particular GIFfile may be embedded within many different pages of the Web site, theGIF file will appear only once within the map. This simplification tothe Web site architecture for mapping purposes makes it practical andfeasible to graphically map, navigate and analyze complex Web sites inthe manner described above.

Because the Visual Web Display format does not show all of the links ofthe Web site, Astra supports two additional display formats which enablethe user to display, respectively, all of the incoming links and all ofthe outgoing links of a selected node. To display all of the outgoinglinks of a given node, the user selects the node with the mouse and thenselects the "display outgoing links" button 72 (FIG. 1) from the toolbar 46. Astra then displays a hierarchical view (in the general form ofa tree) of the selected node and its outgoing links, as illustrated byFIG. 6. Similarly, to display the incoming links of a node, the userselects the node and then clicks on the "display incoming links" button71. (A screen display illustrating the incoming links format is shown inFIG. 22.) To restore the Visual Web Display view, the user clicks on theVWD button 73.

The Solar Layout method (used to generate VWD-format site maps)generally consists of three steps, the second two of which are performedrecursively on a node-by-node basis. These three steps are outlinedbelow, together with associated pseudocode representations. In addition,a source code listing of the method (in C++) is attached as Appendix A.

Step 1--Select Span Tree

In this step, a span tree is extracted from the graph data structurewhich represents the arrangement of nodes and links of the Web site.(The graph data structure is implemented as a "Site Graph" OLE object,as described below.) Any standard span tree algorithm can be used forthis purpose. In the preferred embodiment, a shortest-path span treealgorithm known as "Dijkstra's algorithm" is used, as implemented withinthe commercially-available LEDA (Library of Efficient Data types andAlgorithms) software package. As applied within Astra, this algorithmfinds the shortest paths from a main root node (corresponding to the Website's home page or some other user-specified starting point) to allother nodes of the graph structure. The result of this step is a treedata structure which includes all of the URLs of the graph datastructure with the home page represented as the main root of the tree.For examples of other span tree algorithms which can be used, see AlfredV. Aho et al, Data Structures and Algorithms, Addison-Wesley, 1982.)

Step 2--Solar Plan

This is a recursive step which is applied on a node-by-node basis inorder to determine (i) the display size of each node, (ii) the angularspacings for positioning the children nodes around their respectiveparents, and (iii) the distances for spacing the children from theirrespective parents. For each parent node, the respective sizes of theparent's satellites are initially determined. (A "satellite" is anychild of the parent plus the child's descendants, if any.) The satellitesizes are then used to allocate (a) angular spacings for positioning thesatellites around the parent, and (b) the radial distances between thesatellites and the parent. This process is repeated for each parent node(starting with the lower level parent nodes and working up toward thehome page) until all nodes of the graph have been processed. Thefollowing is a pseudocode representation of this process:

    ______________________________________    Node::SolarPlan( )    IF node has no children    return basic graphical dimension for a single node    ELSE    For each linked node as selected in the span tree, call SolarPlan( )    recursively;    Based on the sum of the sizes of the satellites, allocate angle for    positioning satellites around parent, and set satellite distances from    parent;    Calculate size of present cluster (parent plus satellites).    }    ______________________________________

A modified Solar Plan process which incorporates two additional layoutfeatures is described below and illustrated by FIGS. 23 and 24,

Step 3--Solar Place

This step recursively positions the nodes on the display screen, and isimplemented after Step 2 has been applied to all of the nodes of thegraph. The sequence starts by positioning the home page at the center,and then uses the angle and distance settings calculated in Step 2 toposition the children of the home page around the home page. Thisprocess is repeated recursively for each parent node until all of thenodes have been positioned on the screen.

    ______________________________________    Node::SolarPlace(x, y, entry.sub.-- angle)    Move this node to location (x,y)    For each satellite:    calculate final angle as the sum of the entry.sub.-- angle and the angle    allocated in Step 2; Calculate satellite center (x and y coordinates)    based on new angle and distance from current node; Call SolarPlace    using the above-calculated angle and location.    }    ______________________________________

In the above pseudocode representation, the "x" and "y" parametersspecify the screen position for the placement of a node (icon), and the"entry₋₋ angle" parameter specifies the angle of the line (link) betweenthe node and its respective parent. In the preferred embodiment, themethod is implemented such that the largest satellite of a parent nodeis positioned using the same entry angle as the parent node, so that thesatellite center, parent node, and parent of the parent node all fallgenerally along the same line. (The determination of the largestsatellite is performed in Step 2.) As indicated above, this aspect ofthe layout method is illustrated in FIG. 1 by cluster (satellite) 54,which is positioned along the same line as both its immediate parenticon and the home page icon.

A modified Solar Plan process will now be described with reference tothe screen displays of FIGS. 23 and 24, and to the correspondingpseudocode representation below. This modified process incorporates twoadditional layout features which relate to the positioning of thesatellites around a parent. These layout features are implemented withinthe attached source code listing (Appendix A), and are representedgenerally by the highlighted text of the following pseudocode sequence:

    ______________________________________    Node::SolarPlan( )    IF node has no children    return basic graphical dimension for a single node    ELSE    For each linked node as selected in the span tree, call SolarPlan( )    recursively;    Based on the sum of the sizes of the satellites + minimal weight of    the incoming link, allocate angle for positioning satellites around    parent, and set satellite distances from parent;    Sort satellite list as follows: smallest child first; and in jumps of    two next child up to the biggest and then back to second biggest    and in jumps of two down to smallest (e.g, 1, 3, 5 . . . biggest,    second biggest, . . . 6, 4, 2);    Calculate size of present cluster (parent plus satellites).    }    ______________________________________

The first of the two layout features is illustrated by FIG. 23, which isa partial screen display (together with associated annotations) of aparent-child cluster comprising a parent 79 and seven children orsatellites 75. This layout feature involves allocating an angularinterval (e.g., 20 degrees) to the incoming link 81 to the parent 79,and then angularly spacing the satellites 75 (which in this example areall leaf nodes) over the remaining angular range. In the preferredembodiment, this is accomplished by assigning a minimal weight(corresponding to the angular interval) to the incoming link 81, andthen treating this link 81 as one of the outgoing links 83 whenassigning angular positions to the satellites 75. As a result of thisstep, the satellites 75 are positioned around the parent 79 over anangular range of less than 360 degrees--in contrast to the clusters ofFIGS. 1-5, in which the satellites are positioned over the full 360range. (In this FIG. 23 example, because all of the satellites 75 areleaf nodes, the satellites 75 are positioned equidistant from the parent79 with equal angular spacings.) One benefit of this added step is thatit allows the user to more easily distinguish the incoming link 81 to aparent 79 from the outgoing links 83 from the parent. With reference tothe angular notations of FIG. 23, the minimal weight is preferablyselected such that the angle θ₁ between the incoming link 81 and each ofthe two adjacent parent-child links 83 is greater than or equal to theminimum angle θ₂ between adjacent parent-child links 83 for the givencluster. This layout feature is also illustrated by FIG. 24.

The second of the two additional layout features involves ordering thesatellites around the parent based on the respective sizes of thesatellites. This feature comes into play when a parent node has multiplesatellites that differ in size from one another. The layout arrangementwhich is produced by this feature is generally illustrated by FIG. 24,which shows a cluster having a parent node (labeled "CNN SHOWBIZ") and49 satellites. As illustrated by this screen image, the satellites areordered such that the smallest satellites 85 are angularly positionedclosest to the incoming link 89 to the parent, and such that the largestsatellites 91A-E are positioned generally opposite from the incominglink 89. This is preferably accomplished by sorting the satellites usingthe sorting algorithm of the above pseudocode sequence (which produces asorted satellite list in which the satellites progress upward fromsmallest to largest, and then progress downward from second largest tosecond smallest), and then positioning the satellites around the parent(starting at the incoming link 89) in the order which results from thesorting process. In this example, the largest satellite 91A ispositioned opposite the incoming link 89; the second and third largestsatellites 91B and 91C are positioned adjacent to the largest satellite91A; the fourth and fifth largest satellites 91D and 91E are positionedadjacent to the second and third largest satellites 91B and 91C(respectively); and so on. As is apparent from FIG. 24, this layoutfeature tends to produce a highly symmetrical layout.

Other aspects of the Solar Layout method will be apparent from anobservation of the screen displays and from the source code listing ofAppendix A.

IV. Astra Graphical User Interface (FIGS. 1 and 4-6)

As illustrated in FIG. 1, the Astra menu bar includes seven menuheadings: FILE, VIEW, SCAN, MAP, URL, TOOLS and HELP. From the FILE menuthe user can perform various file-related operations, such as save a mapfile to disk or open a previously generated map file. From the VIEW menuthe user can select various display options of the Astra GUI. From theSCAN menu the user can control various scanning-related activities, suchas initiate or pause the automatic updating of a map, or initiate adynamic page scan session. From the MAP menu, the user can manipulatethe display of the map, by, for example, collapsing (hiding) all leafnodes, or selecting the Visual Web Display mode. From the URL menu, theuser can perform operations with respect to user-selected URLs, such asdisplay the URL's content with a browser, invoke an editor to modify theURL's content, and display the incoming or outgoing links to/from theURL.

From the TOOLS menu the user can invoke various analysis and managementrelated tools. For example, the user can invoke a map comparison toolwhich generates a graphical comparison between two maps. This tool isparticularly useful for allowing the user to readily identify anychanges that have been made to a Web site's content since a previousmapping. The user can also invoke the Action Tracker tool, whichsuperimposes link activity data on the Web site map to allow the user toreadily ascertain the links and URLs that have the most hits. (TheAction Tracker tool is described in detail below under the heading"TRACKING AND DISPLAY OF VISITOR ACTIVITY.") The user can also invoke aLink Doctor tool which facilitates the repairing of broken links. Theseand other tools of Astra are described in the subsequent sections.

With further reference to FIG. 1, the Astra GUI includes a tool bar 46and a filter bar 47, both of which can be selectively displayed asneeded. The tool bar 46 includes buttons for initiatingcommonly-performed operations. From left to right in FIG. 1, thesefunctions are as follows: (a) start generation of new map, (b) open mapfile, (c) save map to disk, (d) print, (e) size map to fit withinwindow, (f) zoom in, (g) zoom out, (h) display incoming links ofselected node; (i) display outgoing links of selected node, (j) displaymap in Visual Web Display format, (k) initiate Automatic Update, (l)pause Automatic Update, (m) resume Automatic Update, (n) initiateDynamic Scan, and (o) stop Dynamic Scan. (The function performed by eachbutton is indicated textually when the mouse cursor is positioned overthe respective button.)

The filter bar 47 includes a variety of different filter buttons forfiltering the content of site maps. When the user clicks on a filterbutton, Astra automatically hides all links and pages of a particulartype or status, as illustrated in FIG. 16 and discussed below. Thefilter buttons are generally divided into three groups: content/servicefilters 49, status filters 50, and location filters 51. From left toright in FIG. 1, the content/service filters 49 filter out URLs of thefollowing content or service types: (a) HTML, (b) HTML forms, (c)images, (d) audio, (e) CGI, (f) Java, (g) other applications, (h) plaintext, (i) unknown, (j) redirect, (k) video, (I) Gopher, (m) FTP, and (n)all other Internet services. The status filters 50 filter out URLs ofthe following statuses (from left to right): (a) not found, (b)inaccessible (e.g., no response from server), (c) access denied, (d) notscanned, and (e) OK. The left-hand and right-hand location filters 51filter out local URLs and external URLs, respectively, based on thedomain names of the URLs. Multiple filters can be applied concurrently.

FIG. 4 illustrates a split-screen mode which allows the user to view agraphical representation of the Web site in an upper window 76 whileviewing a corresponding textual representation (referred to as "ListView") in a lower window 78. To expose the List View window 78, the userdrags and drops the separation bar 80 to the desired position on thescreen. Each line of text displayed in the List View window 78represents one node of the site map, and includes various informationabout the node. For each node, this information includes: the URL (i.e.,address), an annotation, the scanning status (OK, not found,inaccessible, etc.), the associated communications protocol (HTTP,mailto, FTP, etc.), the content type, the file size (known only if theentire file has been retrieved), the numbers of inbound links andoutbound links, and the date and time of last modification. (Theoutbound link and last modification information can be exposed in theFIG. 4 screen display by dragging the horizontal scrolling control 77 tothe right.)

As described below, this information about the nodes is obtained byAstra during the scanning process, and is stored in the same datastructure 114 (FIG. 9) that is used to build the map. As additionallydescribed below, whenever the user initiates an Automatic Update, Astrauses the date/time of last modification information stored locally inassociation with each previously-mapped HTML document to determinewhether the document needs to be retrieved and parsed. (The parsingprocess is used to identify links to other URLs, and to identify otherHTML elements relevant to the mapping process.) As indicated above, thisprovides the significant advantage of allowing the Web site to bere-mapped without having to repeat the entire scanning/parsing process.

With further reference to FIG. 4, whenever the user selects a node inthe upper window 76, the corresponding line in the List View window 78is automatically highlighted. (As illustrated by node 84 in FIG. 4,Astra graphically represents the selection of a node by outlining thenode's icon in black.) Likewise, whenever the user selects a line in theList View window 78, the corresponding node is automatically highlightedin the upper window 76. This feature allows the user to rapidly andefficiently associate each textual line with its graphical counterpart,and vice versa. In addition, by clicking on the headers 82 of theseparation bar 80, the user can view the listed URLs in a sorted order.For example, if the user clicks on the "in links" header, Astra willautomatically sort the list of URLs according to the number of incominglinks, and then display the sorted listing in the List View window 78.

FIG. 5 illustrates a Pan Window feature of Astra. This featurefacilitates navigation of the site map while in a zoomed-in mode bypresenting the user with a perspective view of the navigational positionwithin the map. To display the Pan Window 86, the user selects the "PanWindow" menu option from the VIEW menu while viewing a map. Within thePan Window, the user is presented with a display of the entire map 30,with a dashed box 87 indicating the portion of the map that correspondsto the zoomed-in screen display. As the user navigates the site map(using the scrolling controls 40, 42 and/or other navigationalcontrols), the dashed box automatically moves along the map to track thezoomed-in screen display. The user can also scroll through the map bysimply dragging the dashed box 87 with the mouse. In the preferredembodiment, the Pan Window feature is implemented in-part using acommercially-available from Stingray™ Corporation called SEC++, which isdesigned to facilitate the zoomed-in viewing of a general purposegraphic image.

FIG. 6 illustrates the general display format used by Astra fordisplaying the outgoing links of a selected node 88. To display a node'soutgoing links, the user selects the node with the mouse and then clickson the "show outgoing links" button 72 on the tool bar. As illustrated,Astra then displays all outgoing links from the node (including anylinks that do not appear in the VWD site map), and displays additionallevels of outgoing links (if any) which emanate from the children of theselected node. The display format used for this purpose is in thegeneral format of a tree, with the selected node displayed as the rootof the tree. An analogous display format (illustrated in FIG. 22) isused for displaying the incoming links to a node.

V. Astra Software Architecture (FIGS. 7 and 8)

FIG. 7 pictorially illustrates the general architecture of Astra, asinstalled on a client computer 92. As illustrated, the architecturegenerally consists of a core Astra component 94 which communicates witha variety of different Astra plug-in applications 96 via a plug-in API98. The Astra core 94 includes the basic functionality for the scanningand mapping of Web sites, and includes the above-described GUI featuresfor facilitating navigation of Web site maps. Through the plug-in API98, the Astra core 94 provides an extensible framework for allowing newapplications to be written which extend the basic functionality of theAstra core. As described below, the architecture is structured such thatthe plug-in applications can make extensive use of Astra site maps todisplay plug-in specific information.

The Astra plug-ins 96 and API 98 are based on OLE Automation technology,which provides facilities for allowing the plug-in components to publishinformation to other objects via the operating system registry (notshown). (The "registry" is a database used under the Windows® 95 andWindows® NT operating systems to store configuration information about acomputer, including information about Windows-based applicationsinstalled on the computer.) At start-up, the Astra core 94 reads theregistry to identify the Astra plug-ins that are currently installed onthe client computer 92, and then uses this information to launch theinstalled plug-ins.

In a preferred implementation, the architecture includes five Astraplug-ins: Link Doctor, Action Tracker, Test World, Load Wizard andSearch Meter. The functions performed by these plug-ins are summarizedby Table 2. Other applications which will normally be installed on theclient computer in conjunction with Astra include a standard Web browser(FIGS. 11 and 12), and one or more editors (not shown) for editing URLcontent.

                  TABLE 2    ______________________________________    PLUG-IN  FUNCTION PERFORMED    ______________________________________    Link Doctor             Fixes broken links automatically    Action Tracker             Retrieves and evaluates server log files to generate Web             site activity data (such as activity levels on individual             links), and superimposes such data on site map in a             user-adjustable manner.    Test World             Generates and drives tests automatically    Load Wizard             Utilizes site map to automatically generate test scripts             for the load testing of Web sites with Mercury             Interactive's LoadRunner ™ and SiteTest ™ software             packages.    Search Meter             Displays search engine results visually    ______________________________________

The Astra API allows external client applications, such as the plug-inapplications 96 shown in FIG. 7, to communicate with the Astra core 94in order to form a variety of tasks. Via this API, client applicationscan perform the following types of operations:

1. Superimpose graphical information on the site map;

2. Access information gathered by the Astra scanning engine in order togenerate Web site statistics;

3. Attach custom attributes to the site map, and to individual nodes andlinks of the site map;

4. Access some or all of a Web page's contents (HTML) during the Website scanning process;

5. Embed the Astra GUI within the client application;

6. Add menu items to the Astra menu; and

7. Obtain access to network functionality.

The specific objects and methods associated with the API are discussedbelow with reference to FIG. 8. In addition, a complete listing of theAPI is attached as Appendix B.

During the Web site scanning process, the Astra core 94 communicatesover the Internet 110 (or an intranet) with the one or more Web serverapplications 112 ("Web servers") which make up the subject Web site 113.The Web servers 112 may, for example, run on a single computer, run onmultiple computers located at a single geographic location (which may,but need not, be the location of the client computer 92), or run onmultiple computers that are geographically distributed. In addition, theWeb servers 112 of the Web site 113 may be virtually distributed acrossmultiple Internet domains.

As is conventional with Internet applications, the Astra core 94 usesthe TCP/IP layer 108 of the computer's operating system to communicatewith the Web site 113. Any one or more of the Astra plug-ins 96 may alsouse the TCP/IP layer 108 to communicate with the Web site 113. In thepreferred embodiment, for example, the Action Tracker plug-incommunicates with the Web sites (via the Astra plug-in API) to retrieveserver access log files for performing Web site activity analyses.

FIG. 8 illustrates the object model used by the Astra API. Asillustrated, the model includes six classes of objects, all of which areimplemented as OLE Automation objects. By name, the six object classesare Astra, Site Graph, Edges, Edge, Nodes, and Node. The Astra object 94is an application object, and corresponds generally to the Astra core 94shown in FIG. 7. The Astra object 94 accesses and manipulates datastored by a Site Graph object 114. Each Site Graph object correspondsgenerally to a map of a Web site, and includes information about theURLs and links (including links not displayed in the Visual Web Displayview) of the Web site. The site-specific data stored by the Site Graphobject 114 is contained within and managed by the Edges, Edge, Nodes andNodes objects, which are subclasses of the Graph object.

Each Node object 115 represents a respective node (URL) of the site map,and each Edge object 116 represents a respective link between two URLs(nodes) of the map. Associated with each Node object and each Edgeobject is a set of attributes (not shown), including display attributeswhich specify how the respective object is to be represented graphicallywithin the site map. For example, each Node object and each Edge objectinclude respective attributes for specifying the color, visibility,size, screen position, and an annotation for the display of the object.These attributes can be manipulated via API calls to the methodssupported by these objects 115, 116. For example, the Astra plug-ins(FIG. 7) can manipulate the visibility attributes of the Edge objects toselectively hide the corresponding links on the screen. (This feature isillustrated below in the description of the Action Tracker plug-in.) Inaddition, the Astra API includes methods for allowing the plug-ins todefine and attach custom attributes to the Edge and Node objects.

The Nodes and Edges objects 118, 119 are container objects whichrepresent collections of Node objects 115 and Edge objects 116,respectively. Any criterion can be used by the applications for groupingtogether Node objects and Edge objects. As depicted in FIG. 8, a singleGraph object 114 may include multiple Nodes objects 118 and multipleEdges objects 119.

The methods of the Astra plug-in API generally fall into five functionalcategories. These categories, and the objects to which the associatedmethods apply, are listed below. Additional information on these methodsis provided in the API listing in Appendix B.

ASTRA GUI METHODS. These methods control various aspects of the AstraGUI, such as adding, deleting, enabling and disabling Astra menu items.Supporting objects: Astra, Site Graph.

GROUPING AND ACCESS METHODS. These methods permit groupings of nodes andlinks to be formed, and permit the nodes and links within these groupsto be accessed. Supporting objects: Site Graph, Nodes, Edges.

NODE/EDGE APPEARANCE METHODS. These methods provide control over displayattributes (visibility, color, etc.) of links and nodes of the map.Supporting Objects: Node, Edge.

ATTRIBUTE ATTACHMENT METHODS. These methods permit the attachment ofcustom information to specific objects, and provide access to suchinformation. Supporting objects: Site Graph, Node, Edge. Example use:Number of "hits" displayed by Action Tracker.

SCAN-TIME CONTENT ACCESS METHODS. These methods provide access byapplications to Web page content retrieved during the scanning process.Supporting Objects: Site Graph, Node. Example use: At scan time, textualcontent of each page is passed to a spell checker application to performa site-wide spell check.

As will be appreciated from the foregoing, the Astra architectureprovides a highly extensible mapping framework which can be extended infunctionality by the addition of new plug-ins applications. Additionalaspects of the architecture are specified in the API description ofAppendix B.

VI. Scanning Process (FIGS. 9 and 10)

As will be apparent, the terms "node" and "link" are used in portions ofthe remaining description to refer to their corresponding objectrepresentations--the Node object and the Edge object.

The multi-threaded scanning process used by the Astra core 94 forscanning and mapping a Web site will now be described with reference toFIGS. 9 and 10. As depicted in FIG. 9, Astra uses two types of threadsto scan and map the Web site: a main thread 122 and multiple lower-levelscanning threads 122. The use of multiple scanning threads provides thesignificant benefit of allowing multiple server requests to be pendingsimultaneously, which in-turn reduces the time required to complete thescanning process. A task manager process (not shown) handles issuesrelated to the management of the threads, including the synchronizationof the scanning threads 120 to the main thread 120, and the allocationof scanning threads 122 to operating system threads.

The main thread 120 is responsible for launching the scanning threads122 on a URL-by-URL basis, and uses the URL-specific informationreturned by the scanning threads 122 to populate the Site Graph object114 ("Site Graph") with the nodes, links, and associated informationabout the Web site 113. In addition, as pictorially illustrated by thegraph and map symbols in box 114, the main thread 120 periodicallyapplies the Solar Layout method to the nodes and links of the Site Graph114 to generate a map data structure which represents the Visual WebDisplay map of the Web site. (As described below, this map datastructure is generated by manipulating the display attributes of theNode objects and Edge objects, and does not actually involve thegeneration of a separate data structure.)

Upon initiation of the scanning process by the user, the main thread 120obtains the URL (address) of the home page (or the URL of some otherstarting location) of the Web site to be scanned. If the scanningprocess is initiated by selecting the "Automatic Update" option, themain thread 120 obtains this URL from the previously-generated SiteGraph 114. Otherwise, the user is prompted to manually enter the URL ofthe home page.

Once the home page URL has been obtained, the main thread 120 launches ascanning thread 122 to scan the HTML home page. As the HTML document isreturned, the scanning thread 122 parses the HTML to identify links toother URLs, and to identify other predetermined HTML elements (such asembedded forms) used by Astra. (As described below with reference toFIG. 10, if an Automatic Update is being performed, the scanning threaddownloads the home page only if the page has been modified since thelast scanning of the URL; if no download of the page is required, thisoutgoing link information is extracted from the previously-generatedSite Graph 114.) In addition, the scanning thread 122 extracts certaininformation from the header of the HTML document, including thedate/time of last modification, and the other information displayed inthe List View window 78 of FIG. 4. The link and header informationextracted by the scanning thread 122 is represented in FIG. 9 by one ofthe boxes 130 labeled "URL data."

Upon completion, the scanning thread 122 notifies the main thread 120that it has finished scanning the home page. The main thread then readsthe URL data extracted by the scanning thread 122 and stores this datain the Site Graph 114 in association with a Node object which representsthe home page URL. In addition, for each internal link (i.e., link to aURL within the same Internet domain) identified by the scanning thread122, the main thread 120 creates (or updates) a corresponding Edgeobject and a corresponding Node object within the Site Graph 114, andlaunches a new scanning thread 122 to read the identified URL. (Edge andNode objects are also created for links to external URLs, but theseexternal URLs are not scanned in the default mode.) These newly-launchedscanning threads then proceed to scan their respective URLs in the samemanner as described above (with the exception that no downloading andparsing is performed when the subject URL is a non-HTML file). Thus,scanning threads 122 are launched on a URL-by-URL basis until either allof the URLs of the site have been scanned or the user halts the scanningprocess. Following the completion of the scanning process, the SiteGraph 114 fully represents the site map of the Web site, and containsthe various URL-specific information displayed in the Astra List Viewwindow 78 (FIG. 4). When the user saves a site map via the Astra GUI,the Site Graph 114 is written to disk.

In a default mode, links to external URLs detected during the scanningprocess are displayed in the site map using the "not scanned" icon (192in FIG. 13), indicating that these URLs have not been verified. If theuser selects a "verify external links" scanning option prior toinitiating the scanning process, Astra will automatically scan theseexternal URLs and update the map accordingly.

As part of the HTML parsing process, the scanning threads 122 detect anyforms that are embedded within the HTML documents. (As described below,these forms are commonly used to allow the user to initiate back-enddatabase queries which result in the dynamic generation of Web pages.)When a form is detected during an Automatic Update operation, the mainthread 120 checks the Site Graph 114 to determine whether one or moredatasets (captured by Astra as part of the Dynamic Scan feature) havebeen stored in association with the HTML document. For each datasetdetected, Astra performs a dynamic page scan operation which involvesthe submission of the dataset to the URL specified within the form. Thisfeature is further described below under the heading SCANNING ANDMAPPING OF DYNAMICALLY-GENERATED PAGES.

Once the entire Web site has 113 been scanned, the Site Graph 114represents the architecture of the Web site, including all of thedetected URLs and links of the site. (If the user pauses the scanningprocess prior to completion, the Site Graph and VWD map represent ascanned subset of the Web site.) As described above, this data structure114 is in the general form of a list of Node objects (one per URL) andEdge objects (one per link), with associated information attached asattributes of these objects. For each URL of the site, the informationstored within the Site Graph typically includes the following: the URLtype, the scanning status (OK, not found, inaccessible, unread, oraccess denied), the data and time of last modification, the URLs(addresses) of all incoming and outgoing links, the file size (if theURL was actually retrieved), an annotation, and the associated protocol.

Periodically during the scanning process, the main thread 120 executes aVisual Web Display routine which applies the Solar Layout method to theURLs and links of the Site Graph 114. (The term "routine," as usedherein, refers to a functionally-distinguishable portion of theexecutable code of a larger program or software package, but is notintended to imply the modularity or callability of such code portion.)As indicated above, this method selects the links to be displayed withinthe site map (by selecting a span tree from the graph structure), anddetermines the layout and size for the display of the nodes (URLs) andnon-hidden links of the map. The execution of this display routineresults in modifications to the display attributes of the nodes (Nodeobjects) and links (Edge objects) of the Site Graph 114 in accordancewith the above-described layout and display principles. For example, foreach link which is not present in the span tree, the visibilityattribute of the link is set to "hidden." (As described below, link andnode attributes are also modified in response to various user actionsduring the viewing of the map, such as the application of filters to thesite map.)

In the preferred embodiment, the Visual Web Display routine is executedeach time a predetermined threshold of new URLs have been scanned. Eachtime the routine is executed, the screen is automatically updated (inVisual Web Display format) to show the additional URLs that have beenidentified since the last execution of the routine. This allows the userto view the step-by-step generation of the site map during the scanningprocess. The user can selectively pause and restart the scanning processusing respective controls on the Astra toolbar 46.

FIG. 10 illustrates the general decision process followed by a scanningthread 122 when a URL is scanned. This process implements theabove-mentioned caching scheme for reducing unnecessary downloads ofURLs and URL headers during Automatic Update operations. With referenceto decision block 140, it is initially determined whether the URL haspreviously been scanned. If it has not been scanned, the thread eitherrequests the file from the server (if the URL is an HTML file), or elserequests the URL's header from the server, as illustrated by blocks142-146. (URL headers are retrieved using the HEAD method of the HTTPprotocol.) In either case, the scanning thread waits for the server torespond, and generates an appropriate status code (such as a codeindicating that the URL was not found or was inaccessible) if a timeoutoccurs or if the server returns an error code, as indicated by block150.

If, on the other hand, the URL has previously been mapped (block 140),the date/time of last modification stored in the Site Graph 114 (FIG. 9)is used to determine whether or not a retrieval of the URL is necessary.This is accomplished using standard argument fields of the HTTP "GET"method which enable the client to specify a "date/time of lastmodification" condition for the return of the file. With reference toblocks 158 and 160, the GET request is for the entire URL if the file isan HTML file (block 158), and is for the URL header if the file is anon-HTML file (block 160). Referring again to block 150, the thread thenwaits for the server response, and returns an appropriate status code ifan error occurs.

As indicated by block 164, if an HTML file is returned as the result ofthe server request, the scanning thread parses the HTML and identifiesany links within the file to other URLs. As indicated above, the mainthread 120 launches additional scanning threads 122 to scan these URLsif any links are detected, with the exception that external links arenot scanned unless a "verify external links" option has been selected bythe user.

As indicated by the foregoing, the scanning process of the presentinvention provides a high degree of bandwidth efficiency by avoidingunnecessary retrievals of URLs and URL headers that have not beenmodified since the previous mapping, and by using multiple threads toscan the Web site.

VII. Scanning and Mapping of Dynamically-Generated Pages (FIGS. 11-15)

A feature of the invention which permits the scanning and mapping ofdynamically-generated Web pages will now be described. By way ofbackground, a dynamically-generated Web page ("dynamic page") is a pagethat is generated "on-the-fly" by a Web site in response to some userinput, such as a database query. Under existing Web technology, the usermanually types-in the information (referred to herein as the "dataset")into an embedded form of an HTML document while viewing the documentwith a Web browser, and then selects a "submit" type button to submitthe dataset to a Web site that has back-end database access or real-timedata generation capabilities. (Technologies which provide such Webserver extension capabilities include CGI, Microsoft's ISAPI, andNetscape's NSAPI.) A Web server extension module (such as a CGI script)then processes the dataset (by, for example, performing a databasesearch, or generating real-time data) to generate the data to bereturned to the user, and the data is returned to the browser in theform of a standard Web page.

One deficiency in existing Web site mapping programs is that they do notsupport the automatic retrieval of dynamic pages. As a result, thesemapping programs are not well suited for tracking changes to back-enddatabases, and do not provide an efficient mechanism for testing thefunctionality of back-end database search components. The presentinvention overcomes these deficiencies by providing a mechanism forcapturing datasets entered by the user into a standard Web browser, andfor automatically re-submitting such datasets during the updating ofsite maps. The feature of Astra which provides these capabilities isreferred to as Dynamic Scan™.

FIG. 11 illustrates the general flow of information between componentsduring a Dynamic Scan capture session, which can be initiated by theuser from the Astra tool bar. Depicted in the drawing is a clientcomputer 92 communicating with a Web site 113 over the Internet 110 viarespective TCP/IP layers 108, 178. The Web site 113 includes a Webserver application 112 which interoperates with CGI scripts (shown aslayer 180) to generate Web pages on-the-fly. Running on the clientcomputer 92 in conjunction with the Astra application 94 is a standardWeb browser 170 (such as Netscape Navigator or Microsoft's InternetExplorer), which is automatically launched by Astra when the useractivates the capture session. As illustrated, the Web browser 170 isconfigured to use the Astra application 94 as an HTTP-level proxy. Thus,all HTTP-level messages (client requests) generated by the Web browser170 are initially passed to Astra 94, which in-turn makes the clientrequests on behalf of the Web browser. Server responses (HTML pages,etc.) to such requests are returned to Astra by the client computer'sTCP/IP layer 108, and are then forwarded to the browser to maintain theimpression of normal browsing.

During the Dynamic Scan capture session, the user types-in data into oneor more fields 174 of an HTML document 172 while viewing the documentwith the browser 170. The HTML document 172 may, for example, be aninternal URL which is part of a Web site map, or may be an external URLwhich has been linked to the site map for mapping purposes. When theuser submits the form, Astra extracts the manually-entered dataset, andstores this dataset (in association with the HTML document 172) forsubsequent use. When Astra subsequently re-scans the HTML document 172(during an Automatic Update of the associated site map), Astraautomatically retrieves the dataset, and submits the dataset to the Website 113 to recreate the form submission. Thus, for example, once theuser has typed-in and submitted a database query in connection with aURL of a site map, Astra will automatically perform the database query(and map the results, as described below) the next time an AutomaticUpdate of the map is performed.

With further reference to FIG. 11, when the Web site 113 returns thedynamic page during the capture session (or during a subsequentAutomatic Update session), Astra automatically adds a corresponding nodeto the site map, with this node being displayed as being linked to theform page. (Screen displays taken during a sample capture session areshown in FIGS. 13-15 and are described below.) In addition, Astra parsesthe dynamic page, and adds respective nodes to the map for each outgoinglink of the dynamic page. (In the default setting, these outgoing linksare not scanned.) Astra also parses any static Web pages that areretrieved with the browser during the Dynamic Scan capture session, andupdates the site map (by appending appropriate URL icons) to reflect thestatic pages.

FIG. 12 illustrates the general flow of information during a DynamicScan capture session, and will be used to describe the process ingreater detail. Labeled arrows in FIG. 12 represent the flow ofinformation between software and database components of the client andserver computers. As will be apparent, certain operations (such asupdates to the map structure 128) need not be performed in the ordershown.

Prior to initiating the Dynamic Scan session, the user specifies a page172 which includes an embedded form. (This step is not shown in FIG.12). This can be done by browsing the site map with the Astra GUI tolocate the node of a form page 172 (depicted by Astra using a specialicon), and then selecting the node with the mouse. The user theninitiates a Dynamic Scan session, which causes the following dialog toappear on the screen: YOU ARE ABOUT TO ENTER DYNAMIC SCAN MODE. IN THISMODE YOU WORK WITH A BROWSER AS USUAL, BUT ALL YOUR ACTIONS (INCLUDINGFORM SUBMISSIONS) ARE RECORDED IN THE SITE MAP. TO EXIT FROM THIS MODE,PRESS THE "STOP DYNAMIC SCAN" BUTTON ON THE MAIN TOOLBAR OR CHOOSE THE"STOP DYNAMIC SCAN" OPTION IN THE SCAN MENU.

When the user clicks on the "OK" button, Astra modifies theconfiguration of the Web browser 170 within the registry 182 of theclient computer to set Astra 94 as a proxy of the browser, asillustrated by arrow A of FIG. 12. (As will be recognized by thoseskilled in the art, the specific modification which needs to be made tothe registry 182 depends upon the default browser installed on theclient computer.) Astra then launches the browser 170, and passes theURL (address) of the selected form page to the browser for display. Oncethe browser has been launched, Astra modifies the registry 182 (arrow B)to restore the original browser configuration. This ensures that thebrowser will not attempt to use Astra as a proxy on subsequent browserlaunches, but does disable the browser's use of Astra as a proxy duringthe Dynamic Scan session.

As depicted in FIG. 12, the browser 170 retrieves and displays the formpage 172, enabling the user to complete the form. In response to thesubmission by the user of the form, the browser 170 passes an HTTP-level(GET or POST) message to Astra 94, as indicated by arrow C. This messageincludes the dataset entered by the user, and specifies the URL(address) of the CGI script or other Web server extension component 180to which the form is addressed. Upon receiving this HTTP message, Astradisplays the dialog "YOU ARE ABOUT TO ADD A DATA SET TO THE CURRENT URLIN THE SITE MAP," and presents the user with an "OK" button and a"CANCEL" button.

Assuming the user selects the OK button, Astra extracts the datasetentered by the user and then forwards the HTTP-level message to itsdestination, as illustrated by arrow E. In addition, as depicted byarrow D, Astra stores this dataset in the Site Graph 114 in associationwith the form page 172. As described above, this dataset willautomatically be retrieved and re-submitted each time the form page 172is rescanned as part of an Automatic Update operation. With reference toarrows F and G, when the Web server 112 returns the dynamic page 184,Astra 94 parses the page and updates the Site Graph 114 to reflect thepage and any outgoing links of the dynamic page. (In this regard, Astrahandles the dynamic page in the same manner as for other HTML documentsretrieved during the normal scanning process.) In addition, as depictedby arrow H, Astra forwards the dynamic page 184 to the Web browser 170(which in-turn displays the page) to maintain an impression of normalWeb browsing.

Following the above sequence, the user can select the "stop dynamicscan" button or menu option to end the capture session and close thebrowser 170. Alternatively, the user can continue the browsing sessionand make additional updates to the site map. For example, the user canselect the "back" button 186 (FIG. 14) of the browser to go back to theform page and submit a new dataset, in which case Astra will record thedataset and resulting page in the same manner as described above.

Although the system of the preferred embodiment utilizes conventionalproxy technology to redirect and monitor the output of the Web browser170, it will be recognized that other technologies and redirectionmethods can be used for this purpose. For example, the output of the Webbrowser could be monitored using conventional Internet firewalltechnologies.

FIGS. 13-15 are a sequence of screen displays taken during a DynamicScan capture session in which a simple database query was entered into asearch page of the Infoseek™ search engine. FIG. 13, which is the firstdisplay screen of the sequence, illustrates a simple map 190 generatedby opening a new map and then specifying http://www.infoseek.com/as theURL. Displayed at the center of the map is the form page icon for theInfoseek™ search page. The 20 children 192 of the form page iconcorrespond to external links (i.e., links to URLs outside theinfoseek.com domain), and are therefore displayed using the "notscanned" icon. (As described above, if the "verify external links"option of Astra is selected, Astra will verify the presence of suchexternal URLs and update the map accordingly.)

FIG. 14 illustrates a subsequent screen display generated by starting aDynamic Scan session with the Infoseek™ page selected, and then typingin the word "school" into the query field 194 of the page. (Intermediatedisplays generated by Astra during the Dynamic Scan session areomitted.) As illustrated in the figure, the Web browser comes up withina window 196, allowing the user to access the Astra controls and viewthe site map 190 during the Dynamic Scan session.

FIG. 15 illustrates the updated map 190' generated by Astra as a resultof the FIG. 14 database query. The node (icon) 200 labeled "titles" inthe map represents the dynamic page returned by the Infoseek™ Web site,and is depicted by Astra as being linked to the Infoseek™ form page. Aspecial "dynamic page" icon 200 is used to represent this newly-addednode, so that the user can readily distinguish the node from nodesrepresenting statically-generated pages. The children 204 of the dynamicpage node 200 represent outgoing links from the dynamic page, and aredetected by Astra by parsing the HTML of the dynamic page. In thepresent example, at least some of the children 204 represent searchresults returned by the Infoseek™ search engine and listed in thedynamic page.

As generally illustrated by FIG. 15, in which the children 204 of thedynamic page 200 are represented with Astra's "not scanned," Astra doesnot automatically scan the children of the dynamically-generated Webpage during the Dynamic Scan session. To effectively scan a child page204, the user can retrieve the page with the browser during the DynamicScan session, which will cause Astra to parse the child page and updatethe map accordingly.

Following the sequence illustrated by FIGS. 13-15, the user can, forexample, save the map 190' to disk, which will cause the correspondingSite Graph 114 to be written to disk. If the user subsequently retrievesthe map 190' and initiates an Automatic Update operation, Astra willautomatically submit the query "school" to the Infoseek™ search engine,and update the map 190' to reflect the search results returned.(Children 204 which do not come up in this later search will not bedisplayed in the updated map.) By comparing this updated map to theoriginal map 190' (either manually or using Astra's map comparisontool), the user can readily identify any new search result URLs thatwere returned by the search engine.

While the above-described Dynamic Scan feature is particularly useful inWeb site mapping applications, it will be recognized that the featurecan also be used to in other types of applications. For example, thefeature can be used to permit the scanning of dynamically-generatedpages by general purpose Webcrawlers. In addition, although the featureis implemented in the preferred embodiment such that the user can use astandard, stand-alone Web browser, it will be readily apparent that thefeature can be implemented using a special "built-in" Web browser thatis integrated with the scanning and mapping code.

VIII. Display of Filtered Maps (FIGS. 16-18)

The content, status and location filters of Astra provide a simplemechanism for allowing the user to focus-in on URLs which exhibitparticular characteristics, while making use of the intuitive layout anddisplay methods used by Astra for the display of site maps. To apply afilter, the user simply selects the corresponding filter button on thefilter toolbar 47 while viewing a site map. (The specific filters thatare available within Astra are listed above under the heading ASTRAGRAPHICAL USER INTERFACE.) Astra then automatically generates anddisplays a filtered version of the map. In addition to navigating thefiltered map using Astra's navigation controls, the user can select theVisual Web Display button 73 (FIG. 16) to view the filtered map inAstra's VWD format. Combinations of the filters can be applied to thesite map concurrently.

FIG. 16 illustrates the general display format used by Astra when afilter is initially applied to a site map. This example was generated byselecting the "hide OK URLs" button 220 on the filter toolbar 47 whileviewing a site map similar to the map 30 of FIG. 1. As illustrated bythe screen display, the selection of the filter causes Astra to generatea filtered map 30' which is in the form of skeletal view of the originalmap, with only the links and URLs of interest remaining.

As generally illustrated by FIG. 16, the filtered map 30' consistsprimarily of the following components of the original map 30: (i) theURLs which satisfy (pass through) the filter, (ii) the links to the URLswhich satisfy the filter, and (iii) all "intermediate" nodes and links(if any) needed to maintain connectivity between the root (home page)URL and the URLs which satisfy the filter. (This display methodology isused for all of the filters of the filter toolbar 47, and is also usedwhen multiple filters are applied.) In this example, the filtered map30' thus consists of the home page URL, all URLs which have a scanningstatus other than "OK," and the links and nodes needed to maintainconnectivity to the non-OK URLs. To allow the user to readilydistinguish between the two types of URLs, Astra displays the URLs whichsatisfy the filter in a prominent color (such as red) when the filteredmap is viewed in a zoomed-out mode. The general process used by Astra togenerate the skeletal view of the filtered map is illustrated by FIG.17.

While viewing the filtered map, the user can perform any of a number ofactions, such as zoom in and out to reveal additional URL information,launch editor programs to edit the displayed URLs, and apply additionalfilters to the map. In addition, the user can select the Visual WebDisplay button 73 to display the filtered map in Astra's VWD format. Torestore the hidden nodes and links to the map, the user clicks on theselected filter button to remove the filter.

FIG. 18 illustrates the filtered map of FIG. 16 following selection bythe user of the VWD button 73. As generally illustrated by these twofigures, the selection of the VWD button 73 causes Astra to apply theSolar Layout method to the nodes and links of the filtered map. Inaddition, to provide the user with a contextual setting for viewing theremaining URLs, Astra restores the visibility of selected nodes andlinks in the immediate vicinity of the URLs that satisfy the filter. Asgenerally illustrated by node icons 226, 228 and 230 in FIG. 18, an iconcolor coding scheme is used to allow the user to distinguish the URLicons which satisfy the filter from those which do not, and to allow theuser to distinguish URLs which have not been scanned.

IX. Tracking and Display of Visitor Activity (FIGS. 19 and 20)

An important feature of Astra is its the ability to track user (visitor)activity and behavior patterns with respect to a Web site and tographically display this information (using color coding, annotations,etc.) on the site map. In the preferred embodiment, this feature isimplemented in-part by the Action Tracker plug-in, which gathers useractivity data by retrieving and analyzing server log files commonlymaintained by Web servers. Using this feature, Webmasters can view sitemaps which graphically display such information as: the mostfrequently-accessed URLs, the most heavily traveled links and paths, andthe most popular site entry and exit points. As will be appreciated bythose skilled in the art, the ability to view such information in thecontext of a site map greatly simplifies the task of evaluating andmaintaining Web site effectiveness.

By way of background, standard Web servers commonly maintain serveraccess log files ("log files") which include information about accessesto the Web site by users. These files are typically maintained in one oftwo standard formats: the HTTP Server Access Log File format, or theHTTP Server Referrer Log File format. (Both of these formats arecommonly used by Web servers available from Microsoft, Netscape, andNSCA, and both formats are supported by Astra.) Each entry (line) in alog file represents a successful access to the associated Web site, andcontains various information about the access event. This informationnormally includes: the path to the accessed URL, an identifier of theuser (typically in the form of an IP address), and the date and time ofthe access. Each log file stored on a physical server typicallyrepresents some window of time, such as one month.

In accordance with the invention, Astra uses the information containedwithin a log file in combination with the associated site graph todetermine probable paths taken by visitors to the Web site. (The term"visitor" is used herein to distinguish the user of the Web site fromthe user of Astra, but is not intended to imply that the Web site usermust be located remotely from the Web site.) This generally involvesusing access date/time stamps to determine the chronological sequence ofURLs followed by each visitor (on a visitor-by-visitor basis), andcomparing this information against link information stored in the sitemap (i.e., the Site Graph object 114) to determine the probablenavigation path taken between the accessed URLs. (This method isdescribed in more detail below.) By determining the navigation pathfollowed by a visitor, Astra also determines the site entry and exitspoints taken by the visitor and all of the links traversed by thevisitor. By performing this method for each visitor represented in thelog file and appropriately combining the information of all of thevisitors, Astra generates statistical data (such as the number of "hits"or the number of exit events) with respect to each link and node of theWeb site, and attaches this information to the corresponding Node andEdge objects 115, 116 (FIG. 8) of the Site Graph 114.

To activate the Action Tracker feature, the user selects the ActionTracker option from the TOOLS menu while viewing a site map. The user isthen presented with the option of either retrieving the server log fileor loading a previously-saved Astra Activity File. Astra Activity Filesare compressed versions of the log files generated by Astra and storedlocally on the client machine, and can be generated and saved viacontrols within the Action Tracker controls. Astra also provides anoption which allows the user to append a log file to an existing AstraActivity file, so that multiple log files can be conveniently combinedfor analysis purposes. Once the Activity File or server log file hasbeen loaded, an Action Tracker dialog box (FIG. 19) opens which providescontrols for allowing the user to selectively display different types ofactivity data on the map.

FIG. 19 illustrates the general display format used by the ActionTracker plug-in to display activity levels on the links of a site. Asillustrated by the screen display, the links between URLs are displayedusing a color-coding scheme which allows the user to associate differentlink colors (and URL icon colors) with different relative levels of useractivity. As generally illustrated by the color legend, three distinctcolors are used to represent three (respective) adjacent ranges of useractivity.

In the illustrated display mode (uncolored links hidden, uncolored URLsnot hidden), all of the URLs of the site map are displayed, but the onlylinks that are displayed are those which satisfy a user-adjustableminimum activity threshold. Each visible link is displayed as a one-wayarrow (indicating the link direction), and includes a numericalannotation indicating the total number of hits revealed by the log oractivity file. The number of hits per URL can be viewed in List Viewmode in a corresponding column. As can be seen from an observation ofthe screen display, the displayed links include links which do notappear in the Visual Web Display view of the map.

With further reference to FIG. 19, a slide control 240 allows the userto adjust the "hits" thresholds corresponding to each of the threecolors. By clicking and dragging the slide control, the user can varythe number of displayed links in a controllable manner to revealdifferent levels of user (visitor) activity. This feature isparticularly useful for identifying congested links, which can beremedied by the addition of appropriate data redundancies.

FIG. 20 illustrates the general process used by the Action Trackerplug-in to detect the link activity data (number of hits per link) fromthe log file. The displayed flow chart assumes that the log file hasalready been retrieved, and that the attribute "hits" has been definedfor each link (Edge object) of the Site Graph and set to zero. Asillustrated by the flow chart, the general decision process is appliedline-by-line to the log file (each line representing an access to a URL)until all of the lines have been processed. With reference to blocks 250and 252, each time a new line of the log file is ready, it is initiallydetermined whether or not the log file reflects a previous access by theuser to the Web site. This determination is made by searching for otherentries within the log file which have the same user identifier (e.g.,IP address) and an earlier date/time stamp.

Blocks 254 and 256 illustrate the steps that are performed if the user(visitor) previously visited the site. Initially, the Site Graph isaccessed to determine whether a link exists from the most-recentlyaccessed URL to the current URL, as indicated by decision block 254. Ifsuch a link exists, it is assumed that the visitor used this link to getto the current URL, and the usage level ("hits" attribute) of theidentified link is incremented by one. If no such link is identifiedbetween the most-recently accessed URL and the current URL, anassumption is made that the user back-tracked along the navigation path(by using the "BACK" button of the browser) before jumping to thecurrent URL. Thus, decision step 254 is repeated for each prior accessby the user to the site, in reverse chronological order, until either alink to the current URL is identified or all of the prior accesses areevaluated. If a link is detected during this process, the "hits"attribute of the link is incremented.

As indicated by block 258, the above process continues on a line-by-linebasis until all of the lines of the log file have been processed.Following the execution of this routine, the "hits" attribute of eachlink represents an approximation (based on the above assumptions) of thenumber of times the link was traversed during the time frame representedby the log file.

As will be apparent, the general methodology illustrated by the FIG. 20flow chart can be used to detect a variety of different types ofactivity information, which can be superimposed on the site map (bymodifying node and link display attributes) in the same general manneras described above. The following are examples of some of the types ofactivity data that can be displayed, together with descriptions ofseveral features of the invention which relate to the display of theactivity data:

Exit Points. Exit points are deduced from the log file on avisitor-by-visitor basis by looking for the last URL accessed by eachvisitor, and by looking for large time gaps between consecutive accessesto the site. An "exits" attribute is defined for each node to keep trackof the total number of exit events from each node. The color-codingscheme described above is then used to allow the user to controllablydisplay different thresholds of exit events.

Usage Zones. When viewing a large site map in its entirety (as in FIG.1), it tends to be difficult to identify individual URL icons within themap. This in-turn makes it difficult to view the color-coding schemeused by the Action Tracker plug-in to display URL usage levels. TheUsage Zones™ feature alleviates this problem by enlarging the size ofthe colored URL icons (i.e., the icons of nodes which fall within thepredetermined activity level thresholds) to a predetermined minimumsize. (This is accomplished by increasing the "display size" attributesof these icons.) If these colored nodes are close together on the map,the enlarged icons merge to form a colored zone on the map. Thisfacilitates the visual identification of high-activity zones of thesite.

Complete Path Display. With this feature, the complete path of eachvisitor is displayed on the map on a visitor-by-visitor basis, with thevisitor identifier and the URL access time tags displayed in the ListView window 78 (FIG. 4). This feature permits fine-grain inspection ofthe site usage data, which is useful, for example, for analyzingsecurity attacks and studying visitor behavior patterns.

Log Filters. Because server access log files tend to be large, it isdesirable to be able to filter the log file and to display only certaintypes of information. This feature allows the user to specify customfilters to be applied to the log file for purposes of limiting the scopeof the usage analysis. Using this feature, the user can, for example,specify specific time and date ranges to monitor, or limit the usageanalysis to specific IP addresses or domains. In addition, the user canspecify a minimum visit duration which must be satisfied before theAction Tracker will count an access as a visit.

X. Map Comparison Tool (FIG. 21)

FIG. 21 illustrates a screen display generated using Astra's ChangeViewer™ map comparison tool. As illustrated by the screen display, thecomparison tool generates a comparison map 268 which uses a color-codingscheme to highlight differences between two site maps, allowing the userto visualize the changes that have been made to a Web site since a priormapping of the site. Using the check boxes within the Change Viewerdialog box 270, the user can selectively display the following: new URLsand links, modified URLs, deleted URLs and links, and unmodified URLsand links. As illustrated, each node and link of the comparison map isdisplayed in one of four distinct colors to indicate its respectivecomparison status: new, modified, deleted, or unmodified.

To compare two maps, the user selects the "Compare Maps" option from theTOOLS menu while viewing the current map, and then specifies thefilename of the prior map. Astra then performs a node-by-node andlink-by-link comparison of the two map structures (Site Graphs) toidentify the changes. This involves comparing the "URL" attributes ofthe associated Node and Edge objects to identify URLs and links thathave been added and deleted, and comparing the "date/time of lastmodification" attributes of like Node objects (i.e., Node objects withthe same "URL" attribute) to identify URLs that have been modified.During this process, a comparison map data structure is generated whichreflects the comparison of the two maps, using color attributes toindicate the comparison outcomes (new, modified, deleted or unmodified)of the resulting nodes and links. Once the comparison map data structurehas been generated, Astra applies the Solar Layout method to thestructure and displays the comparison map 268 in Astra's VWD format.(The user can also view the comparison map in Astra's "incoming links"and "outgoing links" display modes.) The user can then adjust the "show"settings in the dialog box 270, which causes Astra to traverse thecomparison map data structure and adjust the visibility attributesaccording to the current settings.

XI. Link Repair Plug-in (FIG. 22)

FIG. 22 illustrates the operation of Astra's Link Doctor plug-in. Toaccess this feature, the user selects the "Link Doctor" option from theTOOLS menu while viewing a site map. The Link Doctor dialog box 284 thenappears with a listing (in the "broken links" pane 286) of all of thebroken links (i.e., URLs of missing content objects) detected within thesite map. (Astra detects the missing links by searching the Site Graphfor Node objects having a status of "not found.") When the user selectsa URL from the broken links pane (as illustrated in the screen display),Astra automatically lists all of the URLs which reference the missingcontent object in the "appearing in" pane 288. This allows the user torapidly identify all of the URLs (content objects) that are directlyaffected by the broken link.

In addition to listing all of the referencing URLs in the "appearing in"pane 288, Astra generates a graphical display (in Astra's "incominglinks" display mode) which shows the selected (missing) URL 290 and allof the URLs 292 which have links to the missing URL. In this example,the missing URL is a GIF file which is embedded within eight differentHTML files 292. From the display shown in FIG. 22, the user can selectone of the referencing nodes 292 (by either clicking on its icon or itslisting in the "appearing in" pane), and then select the "Edit" button296 to edit the HTML document and eliminate the reference to the missingfile.

XII. Conclusion

While certain preferred embodiments of the invention have beendescribed, these embodiments have been presented by way of example only,and are not intended to limit the scope of the present invention. Forexample, although the present invention has been described withreference to the standard protocols, services and components of theWorld Wide Web, it should be recognized that the invention is not solimited, and that the various aspects of the invention can be readilyapplied to other types of web sites, including intranet sites andnetwork sites that use proprietary client-server protocols. In addition,it will be appreciated that certain features of the invention, includingthe layout method, can be applied to other types of data structureanalysis applications. Accordingly, the breadth and scope of the presentinvention should be defined only in accordance with the following claimsand their equivalents.

In the claims which follow, reference characters used to designate claimsteps are provided for convenience of description only, and are notintended to imply any particular order for performing the steps.##SPC1##

What is claimed is:
 1. An extensible software architecture forfacilitating the mapping and analysis of web sites, comprising, on acomputer-readable medium:a mapping component which has executable codefor scanning a web site and for generating a graphical site map of theweb site, the graphical map represented by the mapping component as amap data structure which comprises a collection of node objects and linkobjects, the node objects representing content objects of the web siteand the link objects representing links within the web site between thecontent objects, the node and link objects stored within the map datastructure in association with display attributes which specify how thecontent objects and links are graphically displayed on a display screenwithin the graphical map; and an application program interface (API)which includes methods that enable plug-in applications of the mappingcomponent to access the node and link objects of the map data structureto obtain information about the web site, and which includes methodsthat enable the plug-in applications to modify the display attributes ofat least the node and link objects to convey site-related information toa user via the graphical site map.
 2. The software architectureaccording to claim 1, wherein the API includes one or more methods thatenable the plug-in applications to selectively modify the respectivecolors of the content objects and links within the graphical map.
 3. Thesoftware architecture according to claim 1, wherein the API includes oneor more methods that enable the plug-in applications to selectivelymodify the respective visibilities of the content objects and linkswithin the graphical map.
 4. The software architecture according toclaim 1, wherein the API includes one or more methods that enable theplug-in applications to add menu options to a user menu of the mappingcomponent.
 5. The software architecture according to claim 1, whereinthe API includes one or more methods that enable the plug-inapplications to attach custom attributes to the node and link objects.6. The software architecture according to claim 1, wherein the mappingcomponent stores scanning status information in the map data structurein association with the node objects, and the API includes one or moremethods that enable the plug-in applications to access the scanningstatus information.
 7. The software architecture according to claim 6,wherein the scanning status information of a node object that has beenscanned by the mapping component indicates whether or not thecorresponding content object was found by the mapping component duringthe scanning of the content object.
 8. The software architectureaccording to claim 1, wherein the link objects include respectiveannotation attributes which specify link annotations that are displayedwithin the graphical map, and the API includes one or more methods thatenable the plug-in applications to selectively modify the linkannotation attributes.
 9. The software architecture according to claim1, wherein the mapping component includes executable code for retrievingcontent objects from the web site and for parsing retrieved contentobjects to identify links to other content objects, and the API includesone or more methods that enable the plug-in applications to accesscontents of content objects retrieved by the mapping component, the APIthereby allowing the plug-in applications to access web site contentwhich is retrieved during web site scanning but which is not storedwithin the map data structure.
 10. The software architecture accordingto claim 1, further comprising a plug-in application which runs inconjunction with the mapping component and uses the API to superimposedata onto graphical site maps generated by the mapping component. 11.The software architecture according to claim 10, wherein the plug-inapplication uses the API to highlight links of the graphical map whichsatisfy a prespecified criteria.
 12. The software architecture accordingto claim 10, wherein the plug-in application presents the user with agraphical color-coding key which indicates a color coding scheme used bythe plug-in application to superimpose data onto the graphical site map.13. The software architecture according to claim 10, wherein the plug-inapplication superimposes link activity data onto the graphical site map.14. The software architecture according to claim 13, wherein the plug-inapplication generates the link activity data by processing a server logaccess file maintained by the web site to identify paths traveled byvisitors to the web site.
 15. The software architecture according toclaim 1, wherein the mapping component displays the content objects asrespective icons within the graphical map, and displays the links asrespective lines between pairs of icons.
 16. The software architectureaccording to claim 1, wherein the mapping component graphicallyrepresents parent-child relationships between content objects of the website by positioning children objects around their respective immediateparent objects within the graphical map.
 17. The software architectureaccording to claim 1, wherein the mapping component has executable codewhich allows a user to initiate a scan of a dynamically-generated webpage and to add a graphical representation of the dynamically-generatedweb page to the graphical map.
 18. An extensible software package forfacilitating the management and analysis of web sites, comprising, on acomputer-readable medium:a mapping component which has executable codefor scanning a web site over a network connection and for generating agraphical site map of the web site, and which includes a graphical userinterface which provides controls for allowing a user to navigate andanalyze the graphical map, the graphical map including visualrepresentations of content objects and links of the web site detectedduring scanning of the web site; an application program interface (API)which allows other executable components to communicate with the mappingcomponent, the API including methods for at least (i) accessing web siteinformation retrieved by the mapping component, and (ii) selectivelymodifying the visual representations of the content objects and linkswithin the graphical map; and an application which runs in conjunctionwith the mapping component and communicates with the mapping componentvia the API, the application configured to superimpose information ontothe graphical site map by using the API methods to modify the visualrepresentations of the content objects and/or the links.
 19. Thesoftware package according to claim 18, wherein the graphical userinterface of the mapping component presents the user with a menu optionwhich allows the user to selectively invoke the application.
 20. Thesoftware package according to claim 18, wherein the API includes atleast one method for selectively modifying display colors of the contentobjects and links within the graphical map.
 21. The software packageaccording to claim 18, wherein the API includes at least one method fordisplaying an annotation within the map in association with a contentobject or a link visually represented within the graphical map.
 22. Thesoftware package according to claim 18, wherein the applicationsuperimposes visitor activity data on the site map via the API, thevisitor activity data representing actions taken by visitors to the website during navigation of the web site.
 23. The software packageaccording to claim 22, wherein the application generates the visitoractivity data by analyzing a server access log file of the web site incombination with link data retrieved by the mapping component toidentify probable navigation paths taken by visitors to the web site.24. The software package according to claim 22, wherein the applicationdisplays different links of the web site in different colors torepresent different respective thresholds of link activity.
 25. Thesoftware package according to claim 18, wherein the mapping componentgenerates a map data structure in which the content objects and linksare represented as respective node and link objects, the node and linkobjects containing display attributes which specify how thecorresponding content objects and links are to be visually representedwithin the graphical map, at least some of the display attributeschangeable via the API.
 26. The software architecture according to claim18, wherein the mapping component displays the content objects asrespective icons within the graphical map, and displays the links asrespective lines between pairs of icons.
 27. A plug-in application forextending the functionality of a software package that provides web sitescanning and mapping capabilities, the software package includingexecutable code for scanning a web site and for generating a graphicalsite map of the web site, the plug-in application configured to run inconjunction with the software package and to communicate with thesoftware package via an application program interface (API) of thesoftware package, the plug-in application including executable code fordisplaying web-site-related data on the site map via the API, theplug-in application further including executable code for adding atleast one menu option to a graphical user interface (GUI) of thesoftware package via the API to allow a user to invoke the plug-inapplication from within the software package.
 28. The plug-inapplication according to claim 27, wherein the software packagegenerates a map data structure which represents the graphical site map,the map data structure including node objects which represent contentitems of the web site and including link objects which represent linksbetween content objects of the web site, and wherein the plug-inapplication includes executable code for accessing the node and linkobjects via the API to obtain information about the web site.
 29. Theplug-in application according to claim 28, wherein the node and linkobjects include display attributes which specify how the correspondingcontent objects and links are displayed by the software package withinthe graphical site map, and the plug-in application includes executablecode for selectively modifying the display attributes via the API tomodify graphical representations of the content objects and links withinthe site map.
 30. The plug-in application according to claim 29, whereinthe software package graphically represents the content objects asrespective icons within the site map, and the plug-in applicationincludes executable code for modifying at least one of the color and thevisibility of a content object icon within the map via the API.
 31. Theplug-in application according to claim 30, wherein the software packagegraphically represents the links of the web site as respective lineswhich interconnect pairs of the icons, and the plug-in applicationincludes executable code for modifying at least one of the color and thevisibility of the lines via the API.
 32. The plug-in applicationaccording to claim 31, further comprising executable code for modifyingannotation attributes of the link objects via the API to thereby displaytextual information in association with the links of the web site. 33.The plug-in application according to claim 31, further comprisingexecutable code that displays a color-coding key in association with themap, the color-coding key indicating a color coding scheme used by theplug-in application to superimpose the web-site-related data onto thegraphical site map.